Shane Cassells (Meath West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Taking it in the round is the point I am trying to make. The Chairman is trying to collate everyone in the room, which is why I am running out of time because there are so many people to ask questions. If everyone is working in silos and we are just putting the money into the Central Fund and no one is really addressing how it is coming in, or if there are decreases in income, then we have a serious issue for local government.

Guess who picks up the problem when there are problems with decreases across the board in income from other areas? The figure comes from central Government, which is what we are dealing with today. Councillors will row forever and a day about the fact that they are left without income to run the services properly that they are now expected to run, not just across the normal areas of roads and hosing but also, because of the urbanised areas that we have created, on social issues, arts issues, parks and so forth. They are the issues that communities now expect local government to resolve. How is that shortfall made up? It is made up by commercial rates.

The Chairman mentioned at the outset we are dealing here with €2.2 billion of an overall spend by local government of €6 billion, which is just over one third of what is spent. Let us be honest that local business, not central Government, is the primary source of income for local government in Ireland, providing €1.5 billion in that respect, which works out at 36%. Income from commercial rates increased by €137 million or 10% between 2008 and 2015 during a period of little or no inflation. That reliance on commercial rates has increased from 26% to 37% during that period. Nobody is addressing this issue.

When Mr. Lemass was here a number of weeks ago, we discussed the revaluation process that is causing such distress for so many business around Ireland. When I asked the Valuation Office about it, it was not its officials' problem. They were only doing what they were asked. It was the Department. When I asked the Department about it, it was not its officials' problem, it was the Minister. The only people paying the bill here are the businesses of Ireland. I want to address that here today. Councillors will end up increasing commercial rates because they need funding to run the services and it is the SMEs which will pay it.

By the way, today we praised everybody for their response to Storm Emma in the past week, and rightly so. One would have found that most businesses were closed for those three or four days. They had no income coming into their shops. They do not get a rates rebate for the four days that they were shut. Interestingly, it was reported in the media that there was a bonanza in online sales during those four days. It was as busy in Christmas for them. People were stuck at home so they started buying online. However, the poor people who are running a shop, who are dependent on the door opening and who keep our town centres alive, vibrant and contributing, got hit and got no rates rebate. I think of a friend in Navan who runs a small bakery and has an additional premises up here near these buildings who pays a six figure sum on rates on them. At the end of the year, if Meath County Council is short of money, he is the guy who gets hit. When he thinks of growing his business on those tight margins and maybe employing a second person or whatever, he cannot do so because he does not have the certainty, which Mr. McCarthy rightly spoke about providing to houseowners over a five-year period on how much is due on their LPT. Business owners in this country do not have that certainty when it comes to the commercial rates bill that they will be hit with because they do not know if councillors will be forced to increase commercial rates come the budget at the end of the year. Is this sustainable?